state of exception Archives - Amateur Cities

Article: Critical Imagination

Military check point in the street, Kimihurura Neighborhood, Kigali, 2017.

Contemporary Urban Paranoia

Why We Should Look into the Surveillance Camera The permanent spatial state of exception in the urban environment is a much-discussed topic in postmodern discourse, yet a critical re-assessment of the contemporary situation is needed. The global proliferation of urban enclaves, and in consequence their ghettoization, indicates an urgent need for social sustainability.1 There is […]

Article: Wishful Thinking

State of Exception

The objects left behind in the desert by undocumented migrants on their journey to the U.S. are the unnoticed traces of the human experience of transit. Forced and illegal migration may receive a lot of attention in the media and political debate, but on a human level, it often remains distant and is rarely discussed. […]

Article: Critical Imagination

Call to Action – On How the Political Potential of Architecture can Give Power to a Marginalized Community

With the unstable political ground in recent years, the subject of architecture in the political setting has suddenly gained new interest worldwide. As a response to the post-2008 financial recession and its inevitable repercussions within the built environment, the prevailing doctrine of corporate ‘iconic’ architectural production is now being greatly challenged by the daring alternatives […]